Biographical sketches
M V N Murthy, Chennai

The Royal society is one of the oldest scientific academies founded in 1662 in London. Every year it elects as its fellows eminent scientists from around the world. There are nearly 1600 Fellows many of whom have gone on to win the Nobel Prize. To be called a "Fellow of the Royal Society" (FRS) is considered an exceptional honour. Every year about 50 fellows are admitted to this list of honour.
There are many Indian Scientists among the Fellows at present. The first Indian to be elected Fellow was a shipbuilder named Ardsheer Cursetjee Wadia in the year 1841. Eminent Indian scientists Jagadish Chandra Bose, C V Raman, G N Ramachandran, Meghnad Saha and others have been Fellows of the Royal Society.
The list announced this year (2019) two eminent Indian Scientists--Yusuf Hamied and Gagandeep Kang both of whom are very special choices. Dr. Gagandeep Kang is the first Indian woman to be elected as a fellow while Dr.Hamied is elected as an honorary fellow for his work in providing affordable health-care to very poor people all over the world. Here is a brief biographical sketch of these two people:

Yusuf Hamied
Dr Yusuf Hamied is the chairman of the pharmaceutical company Cipla (Chemical, Industrial and Pharmaceutical Laboratories) which was founded in 1935 by his father, Kwaja Hamied, a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi. It came about to combat shortage of medicines in India at that time.  Hamied's company Cipla is one of the big Indian drug manufacturing companies that is saving millions of lives through the production of low-cost medicines worldwide.
Hamied was educated in Xavier College, Mumbai and earned his Ph.D in chemistry from Christ's College Cambridge. He is well known for not only defying big multi-national pharma companies to provide affordable health care for people in poor countries. 
A significant achievement of Hamied and Cipla is the production of low cost medicine for combating the Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) epidemic. It is a particular life threatening disease which affects the immune system of the body. If left untreated, even a minor infection like common cold may become severe causing death. Not only the virus attacks cells it uses them to make more of the same which spread to other people through any contact with the affected person through body fluids like blood, breast milk etc. It is enough to come in contact with the needle used by the affected person to be infected.
The disease became an epidemic in the nineties with millions of deaths mainly in Africa and the spreading to the rest of the world almost exponentially. AIDS epidemic was responsible in bringing down the life expectancy in South Africa to below 45 years in the nineties. Combating AIDS required development of medicines which became available in the early phase of the spread of the disease itself. However, the multi-national drug companies that held the patent (monopoly) for these medicines sold it at such a exorbitant price (approximately about Rs.10 lakhs per year per person) that it became almost impossible for poor people world over to get any meaningful treatment.
The turning point in the treatment happened when Cipla introduced a cocktail made of three essential drugs to combat AIDS in the year 2001.  Cipla offered the combination drug at a price which almost thirty to forty times cheaper than the prevailing price at that time (cheaper than Rs.100 per day per person now). This prompted the big drug companies also to lower their prices eventually but not before challenging Cipla through various legal challenges or the threat of sanctions by the US government where these big companies were based.  Such a move as what Cipla did would have been unimaginable in Europe or the Americas due to legal restrictions, Cipla was aided by an Indian Government policy, in place since 1972, that in matters of health and in times of epidemics when saving lives is a serious issue, patent is allowed for a process but not the product itself. The world opinion in matters of life saving drugs also turned in favour of what Hamied was trying to achieve. At present, one in three people with HIV infection is taking the cocktail devised by Cipla all over the world.
Through Dr. Hamied's pioneering efforts, Cipla is now a leading drug manufacturing company that is helping millions of people across some 170 countries by providing life saving drugs at affordable cost. He has also worked with governments in sharing the technologies in critical areas with other drug companies the developing world. He has said "I don't want to make money off these diseases which cause the whole fabric of society to crumble".
The honorary FRS awarded to Dr. Hamied is in recognition of his contributions to the state of affordable health-care.

Gagandeep Kang:
Dr Gagandeep Kang is a medical scientist, and the first Indian women elected to the Royal Society. She had her education in Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore where she obtained her MBBS, MD and Ph.D. She worked as a post-doctoral at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. She has since returned to the CMC, Vellore.
Diarrhoea is one of the most common diseases in India (and in many developing countries). It has been a serious public health issue for a long time. Dr Kang's has focussed on the vaccines, infections and nutrition in small children especially in disadvantaged communities. 
The severe diarrhea among children is caused mainly by an infection caused by Rotavirus. Dr Kang played a significant role in developing a vaccine called Rotavac which is now used made in India. These vaccines prevent substantial cases of severe diarrhea in the world. It also decreases the risk of death among children. 
She was a Professor in the Department of Gastrointestinal Science at cMC, Vellore and is currently the executive director of the Translational Health Science and Technology Institute, Faridabad. 
The FRS awarded to Dr. Kang is in recognistion of her work in “investigating the complex relationships between infection, gut function and physical and cognitive development, and seeking to build a stronger human immunology research in India.”
(Source: Wikipedia)